2019 is shaping up to be a garbage fire just like 2018 so let’s get nostalgic for the George W Bush administration! Or expose them as the assholes who got us here. Or both? Vice aims to do all of the above and SO. MUCH. MORE. The style is much like director Adam McKay’s The Big Short which is to say it is the kitchen sink of directing. Just do everything! More is more! But what about the wigs? Let’s discuss.
When it was announced that Christian Bale would play Dick Cheney, the internet basically imploded into a bunch of “huhhhhs?!?!?!” but the film actually covers about 60 years with this idiot so it vaguely makes sense for him to play Dick. Also dude LOVES gaining or losing weight for a part so amen? We first see him as above during 9/11 looking like the pudgy Rasputin he is and then flashes back to the ‘60s where he is a total wasteoid ne’er-do-well who got kicked out of Yale for being the mid-century answer to Brett Kavenaugh and now can barely hold down a job at the electric company. This wig was passably good and not distracting.
Enter Amy Adams as Lynne Cheney (sorry this is the best picture I could find of this wig on the internet - also YIKES birkenstocks!) This wig was actually very ‘60s accurate for the college girl who wants to mold her drunken boyfriend into the eventual creator of ISIS. Lynne has some ludicrous monologue after she bails Cheney out of jail wherein she basically says “you’ve got to get your act together and become a leader because it’s the 1960s and I can’t do it because I’m a woman.” A teenage girl next to me in the movie theater actually blurted out “THIS IS SO CONVOLUTED” and I hope someday that girl becomes president (of the Academy Awards, at least?) This movie is NOT SUBTLE so yep - it basically spells out everything for you in either super convoluted or just blatantly insane terms.
Flash forward a couple years and (somehow?) Cheney HAS cleaned up his act and become a DC intern. I really wish we had been told why or how but this movie HAS NO TIME FOR THAT JUST GO WITH IT. This slightly longer late ‘60s wig is serving some serious muttonchop action and ok? Side note: this section of the movie suggests that Lynne Cheney’s dad murdered her mom and can we get a cold case show on this please? No? Moving on?
Anyway, in DC, Cheney meets Donald Rumsfeld (as played by Steve Carell) and becomes his protege. I have to say that these dude wigs are pretty good because usually dude wigs have this issue where the wig juts out at the nape of the neck and looks weird but these look good. Cheers!
Meanwhile, Lynne is giving her daughters all kinds of Machiavellian advice while sporting this dusty ass cast off from the Nicole Kidman wig collection. This is definitely not the lewk. I’m also really sad that this movie tries to give you ALL THE INFORMATION ALL THE TIME EVEN IF YOU DON’T WANT IT but somehow fails to mention Lynne Cheney’s seminal western lesbian novella, Sisters. It’s out of print but YES I OWN A COPY.
Speaking of lesbians, the Cheneys’ daughter, Mary is one! This is a major plot point in the movie because Mary’s life is in direct contrast to every GOP agenda and Cheney (at least in the movie’s telling of it) foregoes running for president in the ‘80s to shield Mary from any unwanted press about her. Which is nice until about 20 years later when the whole family totally dicks her over. (See what I did there?) Anyway, Mary is played by Alison Pill who is always great and mainly doesn’t wear a wig and instead has these awesome 80s comb-backs and I’m here for it.
Their other daughter, Liz, gets the award for absolute worst wig in the movie (and later, worst sister in the history of the world!) This bleach blonde mess is absolutely recycled from Kate Mara’s reshoot wig for The Fantastic 4 which is to say: THE WORST.
Aaaanyway, by the 1980s, Cheney has become a major DC power player and also has had about 5000 heart attacks (of 10000 total?) This whole lewk is basically off-brand George HW Bush. Lynne is giving me full out off-brand Dynasty and this wig is a definite improvement.
I’d also like to commend whoever was in charge of Cheney’s jowl work.
Finally, we get to Sam Rockwell as George W bush and honestly this is just the best (even if George W Bush and Dick Cheney are the absolute worst). These wigs serve the lewks we’re all familiar with from the early 2000s and also, and I cannot put a finer point on this: absolutely created ISIS. #NeverForget
Oh and Rummy is back to ruin some more hundreds of thousands of lives! I love Steve Carell but his Rumsfeld characterization was definitely: Steve Carell in a wig. There are worse things. Like ISIS!
In this end, this movie definitely shows how darksided all these people were and are while also serving up the best dude wigs I’ve seen in a long time! Lynne’s lewks were inconsistent and Liz’s was the pits but I think the dude wigs outweigh these shortcomings. The movie is kind of all over the place and really could have used more focus on that time Cheney shot that guy in the face (and less time with him justifying any of his darksided deeds!) Still, wig-wise:
